it used to true whenever Bill would look at me,
he’d always have a twinkle in his eyes
and I came to expect to see his smile
every time,
but now I wait for even his eyes to shine
as they did before, for a while I noticed
his eyes still shined, but that beautiful
smile didn’t follow as it did before.
A small upward turn of his lips is all he
could manage, but soon even that will be gone.
For now, his eyes don’t even shine they just look blank,
they just stare straight ahead, not even
the small upward turn of his lips is he able to manage.
The tears well up in my eyes, but I just smile
at him and many times he’d grab my hand
in desperation, for fear that I’d leave him sitting
there just staring straight ahead because he no
longer knows what he is supposed to do.
He took care of me as long as he could, but he has forgotten.
He thinks I don’t want to be with him anymore
He's been dependent upon me for the last five or six years of his life
, and I hate to admit it but it did become burdensome
and I feel guilty, and did I lose some love for him?
but my sister tells me that I loved him
and took care of him ‘till the end
She said I did it so well, and I did it out of love and
respect for him. I don’t feel that way sometimes,
but it is true.
He's forgotten much of what he used to be, a man
so capable of being alive and enjoying the life
he lived and the many things he used to do.
He did love me with all his heart, and he never
looked around to find greener grass. He saw
me at my worst, and my best,
and he loved me deeply through every single
moment of it good and bad. My sister reminds
me of how much in love Bill was with me.
She said she wishes that I could remember
how much it showed in his eyes when
he looked at me. I start to cry, the tears just flow.
I know I did love him too and many times my eyes
would show it when I was looking at him.
He never minded my tears; he’d always hold me
when I cried and he’d say
hat he didn’t know what to do for me
or how to help me. I used to look at him with
the love and appreciation for all the many
things he did through the years out of love for me.
I would tell him that he was doing it, just holding
me and letting me cry on his shoulder was all I would ever need.
Oh, how I still miss him. I find myself smiling
because I hear people outside my apartment
and think it is Bill coming home, just for a moment,
and then I remember that he is sleeping in death.
It still stings after all these years. now I know
why Jeremy had such a strong hold on me for so long.
I miss Bill still, and I wish he was still here to be
my loving husband the same as he was for 30 years.
When I was a child, I was shy and very soft spoken. Now those of you that know me, quit laughing, I was too shy, and I was very soft spoken also. Many children were, not so much today as they were 50 years ago. I felt that I was inferior to everyone. I played normally, most of the time. Red rover, 123 redlight, mother, may I? and all the other games. I was a tomboy and good at running and climbing trees and hanging upside down by my knees. I hated being
inside.
In any case, I grew up despite my inadequacies. Along the way, there were far too many bumps, I thought. When I grew up and look back at my childhood there were some good times, and there were a few times that I did shine in my own right. There were a few times that I did fit in with the rest of the kids.
Remembering an assignment that we had to do on the spur of the moment, the teacher asked us all how we would act if we found a mouse in our slipper when we got out of bed. The teacher called on each of us in no particular order. She usually called on me last and this time was no different. Each student did nothing but yawned, stretched, put their slippers on, ran and screamed. I am so glad that I was last because I thought the way they were all doing the same
thing was stupid.
When finally, my turn came around I yawned too, but I also wiped the sleep from my eyes, stretched, and yawned again. I then picked up one slipper put it on and put my foot back on the floor. I then slipped my other foot into the other slipper made a puzzled face wiggled my foot, and then I picked up my slipper, looked in it shook it. As I watched a mouse drop out of my slipper and scurry away down the hall I took a deep noisy breath, made my eyes wide open,
and then I made my face scrunched up in disgust, and then I yelled out “Mom, Mom, and threw my slipper on the floor. My teacher applauded me and said that what I did would happen in a real situation. Well, it only made sense to me that you had to look and see what was wiggling in your slipper first. She praised me in front of the class. I did shine inside and out. It made me feel so happy the rest of the day.
This class was on public speaking and I loved it. Another time I shimmered was on an assignment of comedy. We were all to write about a funny way something was invented. I told my dad I was stuck and didn’t know what to write about. My dad said he had an idea. I could write on how the twist was invented. I asked what he meant he said maybe an ice cube had somehow fallen down into a
fat lady’s dress. I thought about that and since it was freezing cold while it was melting, she turned one way and then other just trying to get the ice cube out of her dress without reaching inside her dress. As she shimmered this way and that, all the while screaming OOH, OOh, it finally fell out but not before the kids were laughing and they started doing this new dance. They started calling it the twist and from now on, the twist has been a big fat hit.
The other kids in the class loved it and the teacher was howling. Of course, I acted like what I thought she would be doing. All were laughing so much. I walked to my seat and had to pass the teacher. I remember her asking me if I had thought of that myself. I had to admit that my dad came up with the idea, but I wrote the story. She had an A in her book, but she marked it down to a B-. I still gleamed that day, so there was another shimmer in my life. I’m sure there were other times I sparkled too. I just can’t think of them right now.
Somehow as time went on, I grew from a shy child that could hardly speak above a whisper to a woman who had no problem voicing her opinion. It was time, circumstances, and effort that brought me out of my shell and blossom into a writer that is able, as are many others, to put down thoughts that are understood, heartfelt, is able to touch hearts and sometimes tickle funny bones. Isn’t life great?
Scammer does not steal outright They manipulate in secret
Some synonyms of outliers are deviated, anomaly, oddity, abnormality, unconformity, departure, and any other word that means something that stands apart from the rest of society, or a person or group who does not conform with accepted norms or rules.
Nothing about belonging to this particular group of outliers is worth bragging about. These outliers are thieves in the vilest sense of the word. Yes, I was caught in this web of lies until this morning when a new phone number showed up in my contact book for Jeremy. I knew for certain that I caught him and there were no explanations that were believable; and so, did he. Jeremy Clark is vicious in light of his ability to hook women so he can convince these women of his faithful and undying love in the shortest possible amount of time. Jeremy was well taught for he and those he teaches could sell a deep freeze to Eskimos, love to a widow, and fulfil his insatiable need for money.
This a two-edged sword to say the least. Life plays tug of war with our hearts. Elation is in one direction and disappointment in the other. Trying to recover from this heart-breaking trauma we feel as if it is three steps forward (he stole from me)) and back three (but he loves me) and it continues until we finally see them for what they really are. They are vile thieves who have no conscience.
I am not a toxic person, but I was called one several times by Jeremy. I had never done anything like this to anyone. What I had done was put his information online for everyone who wants to look can read about not only my situation, but about hundreds of innocent women who fall for anyone in this unfortunate group of people. I first put this information online in the summer of 2019.
My guess is that he lines his own pockets. Unfortunately, he did totally fool me at times, and I did fall in love with him. (Dreams and reality} proof of my suspicions is in many of my writings and published articles., and these led me into the troubled waters with one who has mastered the art of scamming. This is where my own lack of self-worth snapped shut the trap that has held me captive for three years while he has fed me continuously a special diet mixed with lies and poisonous words of love; and while I suspected him all along, he tried to gaslight me each time I’d catch him and call him out on his lies. Jeremy, I know you told me your first ten years were spent in Switzerland not Singapore like you told me recently.
You may wonder why I word this story the way I do, because it is I who lost so much money to whoever this goes to. There is no telling if the money goes into their own pockets, or for laundering, or to support a boss’s lifestyle, or to buy arms for countries at war and sell them on the black market. I really couldn’t tell you. So many times he’s tried to gaslight me, but I knew what he had told me, I know each time he is trying to gaslight me and I call him on it but he just gets mad and tells me I’m losing my mind. So many things gave him away, but I set those aside and let them go.
He and hundreds of others like him know just from listening to what is said what women want and need to hear. It appeared to me that he knew me better than many people who have known me for years. He knew exactly what I needed to hear, and then he simply sweetened my life with his poisonous words and I was his. Even though I put my trust in him, I had nagging doubts about him being real from the beginning. I listened intently to each thing he said, and many of the things he told me I checked out myself. I caught him in several lies but made excuses for him and told myself that he must have meant or said something different. With his words of love, I became disoriented beyond the point of being able to distinguish the truth from the lies and I could not say with any certainty which of his words were true, or which of his words were false. Yet I listened intently to what he said too and gained as much knowledge of him as he did of me.
They are COWARDS in every sense of the word and YES, I said COWARDS., all in caps They hide behind their phones while speaking poisonous words of love to you and do not even deny what you accuse them of. They are evasive when you ask them questions while they try to change the subject. When they do decide to give an answer because you keep asking until they do give an answer but it is hesitant and vague Their words are empty leaving your questions unanswered which just adds insult to injury. Then they wonder why you don’t trust them and they even act indignant at any suggestion that they’ve not been anything but honest with you.
He did sweep me off my feet and that was no secret; for my love for him obvious to those few that knew about him. He has a thick accent and was supposed to have been born in the US but he said that his accent was because his family lived in Switzerland for the first ten years of his life. Recently he told me it was Singapore.
Each time we have had a fight, it’s been the same one. I believe you scammed me. I believed it yesterday, I believe it today, and I will still believe it tomorrow. You may wonder if I knew these things, why did I stay for three years? And why did I let him rob me of so much?
It was his words filled with poison. It was his wonderful words I’ve never heard coming from any man and directed at me before not even from my late husband of thirty years. His words are pure poison. Any woman who has been taken in the same way will probably say the same thing. I had so much attention given to me by Jeremy, it was as if I had been starving for lack of it. His words were wonderful and they made me feel on top of the world. I felt as if I was back in my 30’s again, not in my 70’s. I felt more alive than ever. His attention and words of love gave me confidence in myself that I was a person that was loveable. I wasn’t just an old lady, he made me feel alive and young again he made me feel as if I were a valuable person.”
Am I not the most to be pitied that I needed such a man to make me see worth in myself? He made me feel good and robbed me while he was doing that.
His words were always kind and loving, his voice soft. He showered me with attention constantly and made me feel as if I were the most important thing in his life. He was romantic, and had no problem telling me he loved me.
In January of this year, everything I had been thinking about for the past three years had been building up inside and again I could no longer keep silent. I said a lot of things. I told him that his accent was Nigerian, and that he lives there. I reminded him that I’ve had shadows of doubt that nagged at me almost all the time. The fights we’ve had were all because of me feeling he was scamming me. At that time, I told him I no longer believed his stories. The words I spoke to him I still believe even more so today.
While I suspected all along that he was stealing from me I did feel that it was only money that he took from me; Even as I am writing this, my mind is telling me that he cares nothing for me, feels no shame and will show no remorse when he’s caught. If perchance he feels any shred of remorse, it’s only because he got caught, not because he’s sorry he steals from widows. By the way, I had a nice talk with the FBI two years ago. I handed in a report to them and the FTC about you, and your stories.
I really don’t owe Jeremy a thing, not even an explanation. He doesn’t care about me. Not only do scammers not care about you, but they do not care how far into debt you get into. They just want money. They just want you to keep on sending it. They are good at what they do and what is it that they do? They make women fall in love with them and shortly begin to ask money from them through many excuses. Until this morning I felt that a liar could not be so good at pretending and could not fake it but they can. They rob you while you love them. They do it in private for a living.
Yahjekwu Greg, is a life coach and he wrote an article giving advice on marriage. He encouraged husbands and wives to think about different things that they not only ought to think about but they need to act on them too so you will be happier, enjoy your marriage, and stay in love with your spouse.
I was very interested in this article and found the information quite useful. I was married 30 years to my late husband and while our marriage wasn’t perfect, we did ok with all the ups and downs that life throws at us. Items of advice included appreciate the little things that your spouse does for you every day, they are sure to build up your marriage. Sometimes when arguments arise and you both may be angry with one another, I know for a fact that appreciation for the little things’ your spouse does for you each day will bring you back to thinking about them and not yourself. It will soften the anger you feel toward them and set the right tone to do some serious talking with each other. This really takes some ability to see beyond the anger, and I am today learning that the person is still your spouse. Really think about your spouse and maybe just little things they do are things you can count on. Such as, do they come right home from work? Do they tell you they love you every day? Do they compliment you on something? If you think about things, you can come up with something.
Along that line is the advice to say that you enjoy the little things in your marriage. The safety you may feel because you are married, always having together time, discussions before decisions are made, family time, couple time. Those are some of the things I enjoy in marriage. Being able to depend on your spouse is a big plus. You know they are there for you and always will be. When the marriage is not in an exciting or critical time just now another thing that will strengthen your marriage is being glad your spouse is a part of your life and be thankful that you have found each other. Sometimes you have to think of these things and remind yourself why you fell in love and married them. Things like these positive thoughts will make you again feel satisfied in your marriage. Remembering why you fell in love will remind you that you really do still love them.
Respecting your mate will always work in your favor, supporting their decisions, and if you respect your partner, you will try to learn to listen to them before speaking in anger. I am working on doing that and it is slow, but I do see that relationships always go better, no one’s feelings get hurt, and no one gets angry back to you.
What about laughing together. This was another piece of advice that he gave. Laughing together is wonderful and it lifts your spirit and theirs too. It clears the air and it makes everyone relaxed and feel closer together. Have you ever been with others and looked at each other and began to laugh a little? It’s private why you are laughing, but you both know what the joke is.
I believe that YahJekwu Greg was trying to get a point across that it is imperative to consciously work on your marriage, you have to forgive each other too. Besides these things I noticed that there were things in his article that had to be a decision that you make and need to commit to. How about deciding to love your mate each day? Decide that every day you are going to work on strengthening your relationship. Decide that you are going to look at the positives in your relationship, and definitely decide that you are loyal and fully devoted to your mate. One will never go wrong when following those suggestions.
Remember that your mate needs to be alone sometimes to pursue hobbies, friendships, and family. Yes, you are part of that circle but just sometimes they need time to themselves just like you do. It’s better allow them to have a little space before they come to you and tell you they need a little space which usually they mean a lot of space. This allows them to be themselves and have some room to grow. Marriage takes work, no one marries and rides off into the sunset and lives happily ever after, that just isn’t what happens in real life.
He probably mentioned a few more, but I cannot think of them right now. He calls them mantras; I call that advice good common sense. When you follow the advice, you will have a strong and happy marriage. Happy marriage to all those who follow this good common sense. Even when your relationship is good and you’re happy, following these suggestions will make it happier and keep it always strong.
When I was just a young princess my hopes of finding my prince became much less hopeful with each frog, I forced myself to kiss. I say forced because with the word going around in that day, it was believed that frogs gave you warts. I certainly didn’t want warts and so it went that I had to close my eyes and force myself to kiss each one of those green, or brown, slimy creatures. Much to my dismay, not one of them gave even a whisper of hope that my prince would instantly appear after kissing those gross little creatures.
So, with a big sigh, and the fear of getting warts from each frog, I would spit on the ground, wipe my mouth with the back of my muddy hand, and spit again just to make sure that I got the taste of frog off my lips and all traces of the cooties they could possibly give me along with warts were gone. About the age of seven when I finally gave up on the idea of my finding a prince by kissing frogs. It seemed totally useless to me. Who believes such a stupid thing anyway? Well, I went back to my usual way of trying to find my prince charming and that was in the daydreams I would allow myself to indulge in each day. I did always wonder what a prince and his princess did when they rode away to live happily ever after. It seems that no one I asked knew the answer to that question either.
I asked Uncle Ernie about that and he said I would just have to wait until mine showed up so I could find the answer to that question. I then asked him just when my prince would be showing up. He told me he wasn’t sure when that would be, but he did know that my prince would show up just when he was supposed to. Uncle Ernie said that my prince might even show up as a knight in shining armor and rescue me from a tower. I gave him a kiss and climbed down from his lap. Maybe I would dream of this tonight. I sure did doubt it though.
My little corner of the attic was just the right environment to imagine that happening. In the winter the bare branches of the big acorn tree next door moved across my ceiling as though they were just waiting for me to fall asleep and they would then snatch me up and take me away. When I heard the wind whistling in the dark and saw the branches dancing across the ceiling in such a foreboding manner it was utterly impossible for me to even close my eyes. It was a pretty scary scene that played over and over again each night. When I got too scared, I would call my brother who slept in a bed on the other side of the chimney from me and sometimes he would let me climb into bed with him and he would put his arms around me. I felt safe with him and sometimes thought that maybe he was my knight in shining armor, but I do have to add that he was no prince charming. He was just an older brother who was mean to me as brothers usually are to younger sisters.
Well, even after some time had passed by and I was growing up I still waited for my prince charming but to no avail. I began to believe that there was no such thing as a prince charming who would take me away to live happily ever after. When I had just about given up on the idea of a prince charming even existing at all, I heard my mother say that she had just found her prince charming. I ran to her and asked her where he was and how did she find him. I was eleven at that time and she told me that I was too young to know how to find one, but she had finally found hers and I would find mine someday. I asked her if she was going to ride away and live happily ever after and leave us here.
About that time I started into JR High School for seventh and eighth grades. It became a painful realization that there was no such thing as a prince charming and there were no knights in shining armor either to come and find me or rescue me from a tower. My life did continue on and even though the reality of there not being a prince charming or a knight in shining armor coming for me on a white horse, I still held out a shred of hope for there to be someone to find me and rescue me from the nightmare of the teenage years. Nope, it never happened. I grew up and went through life in the normal way, getting through as best as I could.
Then one day I realized something miraculous had happened. There was such a thing as a prince charming. I now had the proof because my prince charming walked into my life to rescue me, but he was no prince charming, even though I saw him that way. He did finally appear after much doubt and fear that he would never come to find me and take me away from this house and my siblings. As for what they did and lived happily ever after? They must not have known what it was either, because they did not live happily ever after, and that finally ended her search for her prince charming. She learned that life was just life, and there are good times and bad times and we always figure out how to get through the bad times and we try to remember the good.
cm writes 